Assessing the Impact of COVID-19 Crisis on the Social- Economic Situation: Evidence from the Gambia

Abstract

This study assesses the social and economic impact of COVID-19 pandemic in the Gambia. The data used in this paper was generated from online survey questionnaire, in which the participants were asked about certain questions in which coronavirus affect social and economic in the Gambia. The questionnaire was designed to help Gambia to understand covid-19 impacts on their social and economic situation. The results of this study reveal that coronavirus pandemic affected the people in the Gambia in a number of ways; 1) 84 percent said they should not open borders to more countries while only 16 percent said they should open borders.   2)  In the Gambia, 61 percent of the respondents said the environmental factor that is serious hit due to covid-19 outbreak is the energy sector. 3)  44.2 percent of the respondent said that covid-19 will have fluctuation in growing on the GDP and trade in the Gambia. 4)  Due the serious impact of covid-19 on the societies, 48.8 percent of the respondent in the Gambia said they are very worried that they or someone in their family will be exposed to the coronavirus outbreak. 5) 70.5 percent of the respondent said the outbreak will have negative impact in the economy of the Gambia.  6) As the result generated from the survey, 58 percent of the respondent said in the Gambia, due to covid-19 the recession will happen over the next year.   7) 65.4 percent of the respondents said government implemented an education response for continue of learning in the Gambia while educational institutions are closed.8) 55.1 percent of the respondent said their enterprise used online learning programmes and resources and 32. 1 percent said their enterprise used video conferencing tools and 15.4 percent said their organization used printed materials such as new papers or posters and 9 percent said multimedia including podcasts and YouTube and  6.4 percent, which is the least said TV are used for staff development and training during covid-19 pandemic.9) 50 percent of the respondent to this question of the survey said their organization had planned new training programmes or activities in response to the covid-19 e.g University of the Gambia training their staffs for quality teaching and learning for their students. The implication of the results from this online survey is that it has serious impacts in the Gambia especially in economic situation, employment, consumption, investment and energy. Another policy implication is that, high co2 emission will affect national parks, wildlife and forests’, and poverty, food insecurity and hunger will rises and poor agriculture, the domestic and international migration will be reduces, remittances reduces and those left behind will be seriously affected in terms of health, food security, education, energy and so on especially women, children, elderly and disable that are left behind.